To reduce meeting costs and promote more spontaneous meetings, many organizations are turning to video conferencing systems. In a typical video conferencing system, a local room has a display and a camera, and a remote room has a display and a camera. The two rooms are communicatively connected to one another. Images and sound of participants in the local room are displayed on the display at the remote room, and images and sound of participants in the remote room are displayed on the display at the local room.
While video conferencing systems have successfully reduced meeting costs and have promoted more spontaneous meetings, they are not without drawbacks. In particular, even when using large displays, it may not be possible to overcome the sense of the local participants that the remote participants are not in the same room, and are only “on TV.” As such, the remote participants may not be treated as equal members of the meeting, reducing the likelihood that video conferencing will be used for some types of meetings, such as critical meetings.